Description

You play as a treasure hunter named Panama Joe, whose goal is to find an ancient treasure hidden by Aztec warrior deep inside catacombs. But beware, the catacombs are a large maze inhabited by monsters. Bouncing and rolling skulls, dancing spiders, disappearing and re-appearing chains and tons of fire await you. You'll have to find many keys and unlock doors in order to reach your goal. Panama Joe can jump and climb ladders, but doesn't have much to offer in terms of combat. That's why the monsters in the game should be avoided: a collision with an enemy leads to a premature death. He will also find amulets which make him invulnerable for a short time. Except for the Master System version, they are activated directly when picked up.

There are two ports with significant changes: Panama Joe for ZX Spectrum and the Atari 2600 version.

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Trivia

Prototype version

A 35kb prototype version of the game was created by Robert Jaeger based on the concept given to him by his friend Mark Sunshine. Robert Jaeger began making the game at the age of 15. The game was unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in 1983. The game was bought by Parker Brothers. Parker Brothers decided to release Montezuma's Revenge in 1984, but the game was adapted to the version that required only 16kb of RAM by removing some game elements. Parker Brothers made ​some ​cuts to the graphics, removed the intro, simplified maze construction, and changed the name of the main character from Pedro to Panama Joe.

Graphics

Montezuma's Revenge is one of the few PC titles that supports 16 colors exclusively in PCjr mode.

Awards

Commodore Format

April 1991 (Issue 7) - listed in the A to Z of Classic Games article (Great)